With the Louis Vuitton runway show occurring just one day after this Off-White runway show, it’s easy to look back on this collection as more of a prelude (or, perhaps, victory lap) to Virgil Abloh’s main event. The collection was inspired by New York, with Abloh explaining to WWD that—when he’s in the city—he likes to take in “this cross-section of rich and elite and also thugs and street kids.” For the clothes, he may have been inspired by the blend of lifestyles that make up NYC, but when it came to the collection’s true standouts—new takes on his ongoing Nike collab—the only ones he’ll be hitting are the aforementioned “rich and elite.”

Starting with the Air Max 97, Abloh sent out two new iterations. One arrived in a primarily black colorway, with an dark gray upper replicating his “GHOSTING” technique. The branding is similar to the originally-released Air Max 97, seen in the first iteration of “The Ten”. The second version of the Air Max 97, presented in gray, matches the first—save for the gradient Swoosh on the side panels. According to WWD Abloh also sent out a black version of his Off-White x Nike Blazer Mid, a variation on the original’s white-and-neutral colorway.

While certain pieces emblazoned with nods to The Simpsons are sure to reemerge on street style galleries (Looks 8, 14 and 27) in the near future, there’s no question that the Nike sneakers were the star of the show here. Abloh remains as cool as ever; with a continuously-running, must-have, high-profile sneaker collaboration under his watch, that’s unlikely to change anytime soon.

While Raf Simons has held court over New York, injecting the city with a rush of relevance upon his appointment to the top of Calvin Klein, it was his move to show his own namesake label’s collections in the Big Apple that really set things off. This season, Simons chose Paris to show his work for the Spring/Summer 2019 season. While Simons showed his collections in Paris prior to his Calvin Klein appointment, it’s unclear if Simons will start to split between the two cities, or return to Paris to show Raf Simons (the brand) for Fall/Winter 2019. Stay tuned.

But back to the clothes. Simons’ overall offering was centered around shiny, neon (sometimes both at once) topcoats, inspired by couture fabric and technique. Utilizing difficult-to-tailor duchesse satin, Simons sent out iterations in splashy hues like emerald green, baby blue, neon fuschia, golden yellow and pure white (Looks 1, 2, 4, 5 and 34). As Vogue’s Sarah Mower extracted from Simons, this punchy statement was the designer’s way of rebelling against our streetwear-centric times. “We need a new outline. I know I was part of it myself, but too many hoodies with prints! You know, something needs to shift.”

That’s not to say that Simons wasn’t willing to get graphic. Photographs of punk life in London adorned satin T-shirts (Looks 17, 18, 38 and 40) and other accentuated garments, styled with a sloppy, fresh-from-the-mosh-pit flair that only accentuated the point. Perhaps the most abstract approach to this punk-meets-party idea were mesh-like tops (Looks 12, 13 and 45). It became almost all-too-obvious after Simons’ explained the source material; the wide, round openings symbolize what binds together a six-pack of beer, “Like when kids hang out, carrying their beers...But also, like Paco Rabanne.”

With the color palette and graphics recalling visions of Simons’ go-to musical movement—early-’80s New Wave—the slouchy, oversized knitwear (Looks 30, 31 and 37) made sure that spectators knew they were watching a Simons runway show. Perhaps it’s the blend of punk, romanticism and his own personal history that ties him to this particular movement; given that New Wave revolutionized the sound of contemporary pop and punk rock when it first hit the scene, it’s only fitting that Simons—who revolutionized menswear upon his arrival into the Paris fashion world—would continuously tap the aesthetic for inspiration.

To see both Simons signatures and new ideas on the runway is what has helped the designer become a reliable bright spot on the fashion calendar—regardless of the city he’s showing in. While we’re always anxiously awaiting his next move, this top-tier collection has us hoping that he’s not sworn off showing in New York

It was dramatic as ever at the Palais de Tokyo—Rick Owens’ signature runway show location in the city of Paris. Dramatic and grand, the set was anchored by staircases and shrouded in colored smoke, giving off an air of a car wreck; with the ripped, tattered and blown-out garments that Owens’ sent down the runway, it appeared that his models had simply crawled from the wreckage. “I want to be reckless and dangerous. I want to die a used-up wreck,” Owens explained, as reported by Vogue’s Luke Leitch. Fair enough.

The collection as a whole was characterized and informed by Russian Constructivism, an early 20th century art movement centered around the rejection of ‘autonomous art.’ The movement largely centered around architecture, with its notable works utilizing industrial materials like glass, metal and plastic; the idea was to ‘construct’ art, which is where the movement receives its name.

How does this link up with Owens? His structured, obtusely-shaped parkas that closed out his show (Looks 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 and 40). Anchored by ballooned, tearaway-style bottoms, these stark structured towered off the bodies of the models that bore them. But for all the extravagance and high-concept, they really are just...well, nylon parkas. “They are going to be shipped as nylon parkas, with the poles separately. So you can build them if you want to,” Owens explained to Vogue. “But what you are going to see on the hanger is a nice, soft nylon parka—the poles represent what this parka can be. That’s the idea of hope; that is what the poles represent in a way.”

That idea of hope is exactly what Owens’ was hoping to tackle in this collection. Vladimir Tatlin (a godfather of Russian Constructivism) and his incomplete tower project symbolized that blend of optimism mixed with the impractical. It blended with the idea of Babel (the title of the Owens’ collection) and its biblical tower. As Owens told Vogue “[Tatlin’s Tower was] such a symbol of hope, and there is something so compelling about how it looks. A Constructivist tower is about control, and the Tower of Babel is about confusion: everybody splitting up and too much information, too.”

Show pieces aside, a standout for next summer will surely be Owens’ take on Birkenstocks, which is an official collaboration (Looks 17 and 24). While it’s unlikely that you’ll see many parkas expanded to their towering heights, Owens sentiment feels especially noble during a time where the world feels more chaotic than comforting.

Let’s put it this way, If a show ends with Kanye West and Virgil Abloh crying together—hugging each other in a joint display of celebration, recognition and pride, then you know the show just has to be good.

While Abloh and West’s moment was the biggest celebrity crossover, that’s not to say that Abloh didn’t bring his other high-profile friends to celebrate his first collection. A$AP Nast, Lucien Clarke, Kid Cudi, Blondey McCoy and Playboi Carti were just a handful of names to appear on Abloh’s runway—exemplifying the designer’s unique ability to walk the line between celebrity and high-fashion. If anything, it’s a blend that feels absolutely Wintour-ian. In our Instagram-addled times, this is where fashion is.

According to Vogue, in a pre-show interview, Abloh explained that his show—titled “We Are the World”—was about “white light hitting a prism, and dividing into its component colors.” That explains why the show began with white and then blended out to a section-by-section block of various colors and patterns (that said, the opening white looks felt more like a palette cleanser from the Jones-era, revealing a new era for Vuitton). Like Simons the day before, Abloh would use his Vuitton debut to dissect trendy tailoring (Looks 1, 4, 7, 10, 12 and 14—among others).

Looks in this first block, and all others after, would hit upon Vuitton’s history as an accessories-focused house. Weekender bags (Looks 27, 28 and 33), pocketed vests (Looks 38, 40 and 42), a new ‘Jordan-esque’ sneaker silhouette (Look 43)—even various holsters (Looks 20, 39, 41) (reminding this writer of Dries Van Noten’s Spring/Summer 2015 and Abloh’s 2018 Met Gala outfit)—accentuated the looks they adorned; it’s proof that while Abloh is there to design men’s apparel, he’s looking to embed the ‘portage’ aspect of the Louis Vuitton legacy within his designs… literally.

The rainbow connection concept of his collection didn’t purely apply to colorways either; references to The Wizard of Oz, seen on poppy-laden outerwear (50, 51 and 55) (which recalled visions of Supreme’s rose-covered fleece from Supreme’s Fall/Winter 2016 collection) and an intersia knit featuring the film’s four protagonists (Look 54).

Abloh’s yellow brick road has led him to this current post at Louis Vuitton, revealing him (and his ‘sampling’ approach to fashion) as this generation’s “Man Behind the Curtain” (Look 56). If this collection is only the beginning of his fashion ‘wizardry’ at one of the most valuable brands in the land—we’re ready to follow Abloh… well, “over the rainbow” to wherever he’ll take us next.

Of course Sacai was going to have an incredible show—that’s something we expected before the season began. New Nikes? That we should have seen coming as well.

For Spring/Summer 2019, Chitose Abe sent out specimens featuring her signature spliced-up technique with some aesthetic help from tattoo artist Dr Woo. The offering included denim with sukajan silks (Looks 13 and 16), suiting with nylons (Looks 29 and 31) and—most obviously—plenty of Pendleton prints on nearly everything else (Looks 4, 5, 50, 51, 53 and 55). The effect was mixed-up, but consistently ‘fun’ in that equally consistent ‘Abe’ way.

But, clothing aside, there’s something else that caught our eye on the Sacai runway. A frequent Nike collaborator, it’s not all that surprising that Abe would add Nike silhouettes to her show. This season, the sneakers were as mashed-up as the garments, with one model combining the Waffle Daybreak Runner with the LDV, and another combinining the hightop Dunk with the Blazer. The effect was Abloh-ian, with double tongues, stacked soles and overlaid side-panel Swooshes.

As many seasoned fashion followers will remind you, if you’re not paying attention to Sacai, then ‘missing out’ doesn’t even begin to describe the problem. (For a bit of armchair fashion commentary, consider this: When—not if—is Abe going to helm a major Parisian maison? Which one will it be? Those are the real questions).

Outside of Virgil Abloh, the other splashy new appointment in Paris was clearly Kim Jones’ switch from Louis Vuitton to Dior Homme. With a blockbuster finale last season, the question was clear: Could Jones translate his contemporary aesthetic (and success) over to a new house? The short answer: Dear God, yes.

It begins with the pre-show details. A stacked celebrity front row—starring everyone from Abloh and A$AP Rocky to personal friends Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss (fitting, given Jones’ Vuitton finale)—cemented the show as high-profile Parisian gathering. Speaking of 'high-profiles,' one could hardly miss the massive, Dior-suited, Pink KAWS BFF (composed entirely of flowers) at the center of the circular runway. The pair will be collaborating on a plush dropping—theoretically—in the near future.

There are two sides to this Dior menswear collection, with the references to Christian Dior both as a couturier and, simply put, as a man in his time. It could be seen in nods to the wallpaper of Mr. Dior’s first boutique—with intricate, toile de Juey florals (Looks 19, 20, 21 and 22)—to the man’s love of roses (if the KAWS installation wasn’t enough of a hint, Looks 24, 27 and the deailing on 47 are subtle indications). The suiting with an off-center button closure (Looks 9, 11, 31, 32 and 48)—featuring the “Oblique” cut—is (as noted by Vogue’s Sarah Mower) a reference to a Dior couture collection from 1955.

From the archival to the abstract; from big to small, Jones clearly studied Dior in 360 degrees to inform his debut. Speaking of the small details, Jones used these to pay homage to his friends in the present day. Yoon Ahn of Ambush (Dior Homme’s official jewelry designer) made her own debut with “CD”-logo rings, chains and stud earrings. Matthew Williams of Alyx (making his own Paris debut the day after) reworked his insanely-popular Rollercoaster Belt and buckle (Looks 41, 43 and 45) to accessorize several ensembles in one way or another. With an A-list showing in both the front row and in the atelier, Jones’ debut for Dior is a reminder of a simple ‘Kim Jones fact’: The designer is one of the most-well-liked men in fashion.

It is known that Jones has a knack for riding the thoroughly modern line between ‘true luxury’ (shout out the couture-level attention-to-detail seen here) and the commercial (shout out that whole Louis Vuitton x Supreme thing). Jones will be applying this blend of philosophies in collaborative denim pieces (Look 40), featuring KAWS renditions of the Dior bee dropping in December ahead of the collection. Another sign that Jones is putting his own mark on his new post? Once Dior Homme, Jones decided to swap the name to Dior Man. Given that Jones' Dior Homme predecessor, Hedi Slimane, has a penchant for changing names to suit his time at a house, this seems like fair game. Besides, given that Slimane defined a Dior Homme aesthetic that would carry on through the work of Kris Van Assche, with Jones' arrival, that aesthetic is finally bound for change; a new era is the best time for a new name.

A reminder of Jones’ abilities as both a “creative director” and “fashion designer,” this runway show did exactly what a major maison debut should do: Create a concoction of celebrity, creativity and craftsmanship that can dazzle everyone from the fashion blogs to the LVMH boardroom. With Jones at Dior and personal friend (obviously) Virgil Abloh holding down the fort at his former employer, it’s clear that LVMH has the heat to go toe-to-toe with the giants at Kering. Jones' fusion of street(wear)-smart tailoring has never felt fresher.

With celebrity co-signs and a contribution to Kim Jones’ premiere at Dior Homme, the only thing Paris Fashion Week was missing was the runway debut of Matthew Williams’ Alyx (or rather, 1017 Alyx 9SM). While Williams’ work has already established itself as a cult favorite among the fashion set and those in-the-know, this collection was as much of a ‘formal introduction’ as anything else. There were plenty of Alyx’s seasonless signatures reappearing for the runway, but that was practically the point; As Williams explained to Vogue, the show “was meant to really present what we’ve built, the things that define the DNA of the brand.” When it comes to Alyx, this is (very) good thing.

This is most notably seen in Alyx’s cult-favorite accessories; the Crossbody bag (Looks 7 and 42), the Chest Rig (Looks 3, 35 and 36), the Tank backpack (Looks 26 and 27) and—naturally—the Rollercoaster belt (Looks 1, 12, 37 and 49) are all present and accounted for. It wouldn’t feel right without them.

It wouldn’t feel right without a little Nike influence either. With the Swoosh taking over runways all across Europe this season, it only makes sense that the sportswear giant’s splashy new collaborator would get in on the action too. Aside from unveiling a new collaboration trainer, Williams had Nike-branded turtlenecks, T-Shirts and techy accessories to round out his contemporary offering (Looks 12, 16, 24 and 31). His Nike sneaker was the stage for a particular point Williams was exploring: inverting the internal, making it external. Speaking on the exoskeleton-like casings surrounding his sneakers, Williams explained to Vogue, “[it’s like] something that would normally be underneath, kind of pushing itself out and still creating a cover.”

That idea of something ‘pushing through’ and rising to the surface is rather fitting when thinking about fashion month at large—Paris at the very least. As the maisons’ old guard steps aside to to support a new roster of creative directors, what’s rising to the top represents a thoroughly modern mix of celebrity, sportswear, streetwear, techwear and industrial design—all working in sync. Be it Kim Jones at Dior or Virgil Abloh at Louis Vuitton (fittingly both happen to be Williams’ personal friends), high fashion isn’t simply tapping into the nebulous idea of ‘streetwear,’ it’s hiring the designers who have studied, contemplated and come-from the world itself. Given Williams’ adjacency to DONDA, #BEEN TRILL# and denim design (Looks 21, 25 and 53), there’s a unique level of authenticity in this show—something that’s only bolstered by Williams’ personable presence both on social media and in the front row at his friends’ shows in Paris this season.

Williams may have been showing the breadth of his brand over the past four years for Spring/Summer 2019; it just so happens that—based on what we’ve seen here—he’s showing us what we’ll be craving for the next four.